CHAPTER XII
"I kept on rowing until daylight, when ahead of me I saw a streak of land. It was a great way off, so I rested and ate before recommencing my rowing. I was afraid to stop for fear a storm should spring up and wreck my small craft.
"It was early evening when I finally reached land, which was a rocky shore backed by high cliffs and mountains.
"I landed on the barren shore very stiff and weary, with my hands blistered and bleeding, and stumbled a short distance up the steep mountain path.
"I had not gone far before I met two shepherds who were eating their evening meal at the door of a little hut at one side of the path. I must have looked rather ill, for they both got up and took me into the hut and were very kind to me. They gave me a big bowl of warm broth, some oaten cakes, and made me stay the night with them. I tried to tell them of my adventure, but as they spoke a strange tongue they could not understand me. I made up my mind that I had better stay with them until I could find out where I was.
"The chief business of that mountainous country is sheep raising and weaving baskets from a very pliable kind of shrub that grows on the slopes of the mountains. I hired as a shepherd to a sheep rancher, and also began to learn to weave baskets to while away the time as I watched the sheep. Before long I learned the language, which is a very simple one, and found that I was in Aeda Land, but that the desert I sought lay far to the south, through the mountain passes. It was already winter high up in the mountains, and the passes were full of snow, so I would be obliged to wait until spring before going on.
"I settled down to wait and soon became so skilful at weaving that I could make more baskets in a couple of days than many of the older weavers could make in a week.
"Early in the spring the merchant ships arrived for their annual cargo of wool and baskets, and after I had sold my baskets I found that I had added quite a nice little sum in silver to my store of gold.
"The snow had now all melted in the mountain passes, so I said good-bye to my kind friends the shepherds, giving each of them a tiny basket as a keepsake, in which I had hidden some gold pieces, packed a knapsack, and set off on foot for the desert country.
"It was a long walk up the steep mountain path, but after two days' journey I reached the top and could look down into the valley. Miles away stretched the yellow sands of the desert, perfectly bare, excepting for a sort of island of trees in the middle. All around the desert lay the mountains excepting to the west, where the sandy valley extended to the sea. Villages and peach orchards lay just at the foot of the mountains, and extended part way up to slopes, but the largest village appeared to be on the seacoast, and to that one I directed my steps.
"As I descended the steep winding path the air became warmer, and when I reached the valley I found that it was already midsummer there, and the fruit was ripening on the trees.
"I came at last to the town on the edge of the sea, where I put up at an inn, and after a much-needed rest I sought out the inn-keeper and asked for information about the Wonderful Plant.
"Nobody, he told me, had ever crossed the desert, though hundreds had tried to do so, for everyone knew that it was in the very center of the oasis that the Wonderful Plant grew. He had never been able to find out why it was a Wonderful Plant; some said it had a flower that never died, the perfume of which would keep off trouble, others said that its leaves, crushed and eaten, would cure all ills, and yet others thought that if planted in an orchard it would ensure a wonderful fruit crop forever afterwards.
"However, nobody really knew, because there were great creatures that guarded the oasis and chased travelers. Giants they were, with dreadful twisted features, and sometimes they rode horrible twisted horses, and sometimes awful camels. Nobody had ever been killed by them, for all had been wise enough to return as quickly as possible when the giants approached.
"Sometimes indeed travelers had been attacked and chased by a huge toucan which lived on the oasis, and which knocked them down and battered them with its wings, but they had managed to escape with their lives. Nobody, he added, had tried to cross for a long time now; it was altogether too impossible.
"I was very much interested, especially in the toucan, and asked what manner of bird it was.
"'It is a terrible creature,' answered the inn-keeper, 'and the terror of the countryside. It is at least ten feet in length and has an enormous beak. It delights to steal our peaches, and in spite of all we can do ruins a good many crops every year. Scarecrows, be they ever so large, do not frighten it, and it will eat all the fruit from a dozen trees in an hour. It merely stands on the ground, shakes the tree with its beak until the fruit falls, and then gobbles it up.'
"I asked him what it lived on when there were no peaches to eat, but he did not know. It did not matter, he added gloomily, it did damage enough, and had just the day before cleaned off two of his very best trees.
"For the next few days I wandered about, going to the edge of the desert and wondering how I was going to get across the yellow sands over which no traveler had ever journeyed far.
"One day as I sat under a tree on a favorite stone meditating I noticed a large dark object coming through the air towards me. It was the toucan. I kept still and watched him. He stopped over a peach tree which grew at the bottom of an orchard not far off, and alighting on the ground walked over and deliberately shook the tree. Down fell the delicious fruit in a shower. Harder and harder he shook until not a peach that was at all ripe remained. Then he walked around and leisurely swallowed the peaches as a chicken swallows corn kernels.
"He had not finished before the farmer came running out with his wife and sons, all beating tin pans and shouting. The toucan let them approach quite close, and then made a sudden dive at them with his wings down, rose in the air right over their heads and flew away with a loud chuckling kind of noise that sounded like a laugh. The farmer and his family fell over each other in their fright, and when they had recovered their feet the bird was far away.
"It was all so funny that I had to laugh, and then I thought of a scheme for getting across the desert."